China’s President Xi Jinping was re-elected for his third term on Friday (10) after being unanimously chosen by the nearly 3,000 parliamentarians that make up the National People’s Congress. Xi, 69, was the only candidate and had already been appointed by the Communist Party as general secretary and commander of the military commission, the country’s most senior posts.
Until 2018, China had limits on how long a president could hold office, but the country’s constitution has been amended. In power since 2013 after serving two terms, Xi will now have a third term with another 5 years at the helm of the second largest economy in the world.
The Chinese president leads a Communist Party that is more than 100 years old and has 96.71 million members, according to the South China Morning Post. China has 1.41 billion inhabitants.
The Chinese president’s new term will take place during the heightening of competition with the US for global hegemony, a dispute that is marked by sanctions and friction.
In a previous session of the National People’s Congress, Xi criticized the US and its alliances aimed at isolating China: “Western countries, led by the US, have implemented complete containment and suppression of China, which has brought unprecedented severe challenges to China’s development. country”.
In addition to the geopolitical dispute, a Gallup poll released this week indicates that there is distrust of the US population with China. Only 15% of Americans have a favorable view of China, the lowest since the index began to be calculated in 1979.
Editing: Rodrigo Durão Coelho
